


[this could’ve been] a heroine’s greatest regret

by petroltogo



Series: flip a coin [head for villain, tail for hero] [2]
Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: A Character's Slow Descend Into Questionable Morals, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Bullying, Emotional Hurt, Gen, Hana Is Lowkey A BAMF, Hana Is Not A Nice Person But She Is Not A Terrible Person Either, Hana The Conspiracy Theorist, Is There Any Other Hana Though?, It's Not A Flattering Picture, Listen Everyone In This Verse Is Fucked Up, Mental Health Issues, Mentions of Character Death, Mentions of Murder, Morally Ambiguous Character, Or Is It 'Clammy'?, Outtakes, Smart Hana, So Is Hana, Superhero Hana, Superhero Institution Vongola Inc., Superhero Tsuna, Superheroes and supervillains, There Is Something Fishy Going On Here, Things Get Better But They Also Get Worse, Tsuna Is Not Made For His Job And Absolutely No One Appreciates It, Tsuna Is Trying His Best, Tsuna Still Has No Self-Esteem, Tsuna Through The Eyes Of His Squad, Unhealthy Work Relationships, Vongola Inc. Attack Squads Are Not Good For Your Mental Health, no comfort, outside pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-12 03:48:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29878626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petroltogo/pseuds/petroltogo
Summary: Hana doesn’t set out to hate Sawada Tsunayoshi. [But if she had? If she had. It would’ve beeneasy.]Good plans aren’t always enough.
Relationships: Kurokawa Hana & Sasagawa Kyouko, Kurokawa Hana & Sawada Tsunayoshi
Series: flip a coin [head for villain, tail for hero] [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2085798
Comments: 16
Kudos: 99





	[this could’ve been] a heroine’s greatest regret

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: Like the first part of this 'verse, this story is fairly dark, though not without some light. If there are any warnings missing from the tags that I should include, please let me know.
> 
> Regarding the timeline, this is set in the first two years of Tsuna's time at Vongola Inc. _before_ he ever ran into Skull, the Varia and Byakuran for the first time. ALSO this is an outtake that could be canon to this verse but doesn't have to be.

Kurokawa Hana had a plan.

That is to say, Kurokawa Hana _always_ has a plan. Ever since she had the limited foresight to befriend a budding supervillain with a brilliant smile, kind heart and devious mind and her annoying, obtuse, came-with-the-package brother it’s been Hana’s job to have a plan. To be prepared to cover for Kyouko’s random bouts of the destruction that were never harmful, rarely even dangerous, but always crossed the line from harmless into whatever comes after that.

And it’s because Hana always plans, always looks at situations in a 'where could I go from here' and 'what’s gonna lead me to where I want to go in the most direct way' that she knows all too well that plans fail. No matter how much time you spend thinking, analyzing, crunching numbers. No matter how _good_ you’re at it, you can never account for random coincidence. You can never account for spur-of-the-moment decisions and you can never include all outside factors in your predictions.

Hana knows that. And she likes to think she can handle seeing her plans fail, having to readjust and backtrack and recalculate fairly well. Sawada has certainly taught her that, if not much else.

But when she first started out at Vongola, Hana wasn’t that used to it yet. High school and after school gymnast training kept the world small, kept it neat and predictable for the most part. And so when Hana first starts out at Vongola, she does so with a very clear, streamlined plan in her mind for how her career will turn out.

[Hana’s mother is one of the best lawyers Vongola Inc. ever had the presence of mind to hire and Hana strives to be nothing less than that. She’ll start at an attack squad because variety is important and because getting a feeling for how other sections operate will help her predict the kind of faux-passes, mistakes and broken laws she can expect from their field operatives — and it will give her time for her mother’s contract to run out. The last thing Hana wants is to work in the same office as her mother. She made it into Vongola Inc. on her own merits and she’s gonna rise to the top on her own merits and everyone who gets into her way is going to regret it.]

She’s assigned to a newly-formed attack squad under Mochida Kensuke. Hana doesn’t think much of her new squad leader or the other squad members but Hana doesn’t think much of most people, so that really doesn't mean anything.

It’s when she realizes that one of her new squad members is _Sawada Tsunayoshi_ that Hana finds herself pause for a moment because she knows that name. You can only attend so many Child of Interest™ classes together before you put a name to every face. And sure, most of those children end up at Vongola Inc. in some fashion — either because they’re offered a great opportunity or because it’s the safest option — but Hana privately never thought Sawada would be one of them.

She doesn’t have much of an opinion on the boy, they’ve never been close, but he _hates_ violence. He used to cry during the harsher kidnapping lessons and he refused to make the attack moves in self-defense classes and basically Hana can’t think of a single place less suited for Sawada than a Vongola Inc. _attack squad_. But okay then.

Sometimes people surprise you and Hana doesn’t know Sawada that well, so she pushes the surprise aside. It’s none of her business what other people do with their lives and besides training those first few weeks is intense enough that she doesn’t have time to worry about anyone but herself.

But it’s not that easy.

Sawada doesn’t make it easy.

He comes last in every exercise if he manages to finish at all. He flinches every time one of the others — mostly Mochida — yell or snap at him. He earns them more punishments than all other squad members put together. His arms shake so hard during shooting lessons, he almost shoots the instructor on accident.

It’s.

[They’re a Vongola Inc. attack squad. And sure, they’re just at the beginning of their training, but they’re training to become one of the most effective operatives out there. They’re training to fight supervillains. They’re training to kill.

Attack squads are _glorified killers on a very thin leash_ , surely Sawada knows that?!]

Tensions in the squad rise with every passing day Sawada continues to stumble through training alongside them. It starts out as sharp comments, but Hana isn’t blind, she knows what bullying looks like. She knows why Mochida is looking the other way.

[Sawada doesn’t belong here. He’s a danger to himself, would be a danger to them should he ever make it to the field and Hana doesn’t understand why he keeps on coming. There are other highly-sought after positions at Vongola Inc., safer positions, positions that might actually work _for_ Sawada instead of _against_ him. It’s not even like he’s happy to be here, like this is his big dream when he hates even the practice fights so _what the fucking hell_ is he still doing here?]

* * *

They’re close to finishing their training, less than a week away from getting their field license, when Mochida finally loses his patience with Sawada after the dumbass manages to down his own team member through friendly fire. [With paintballs, sure. But it won’t always be _paintballs_.]

Hana watches from the sidelines as Mochida screams himself hoarse and Sawada flinches and shrinks and stutters and cries.

[It used to make Hana uncomfortable, watching Sawada cry. A bit like watching Ito Hina talk down to Sasawaga when he asked her out during their last year of high school because using only words with four syllables and more _obviously_ means you are way more intelligent, congratulations, everyone would tremble in awe before your amazing intellect if only they had a fucking clue what you’re talking about. But, well. Hana has spent the past four months crawling through muddy field after muddy field, training until her arms and legs gave up on her and she barely made it home, chopped off her hair one day when she got so damn frustrated by the twigs that kept getting stuck in it and she’s seen Sawada cry every other day.

Looking back she doesn’t even know at which point the tears stopped bothering her. Hana must have become desensitized to the sight — like everyone else on the squad, probably. Hell, at this point Hana doesn’t even feel second-hand embarrassment or discomfort. She feels nothing at all. She’s tired and they’ve failed this exercise six times already and she wants to go home. Hana doesn’t have the energy or emotional capacity to feel sympathy for Sawada.

She just wants him _gone_.]

Really, the only surprise is that it took this long. [That Mochida still has enough self-control to keep from getting physical about it. Hana isn’t sure everyone else on the squad would have the same control.] In the end, Mochida throws his arms up in the air, gives Sawada one last, disgusted look, whirls around on his heels and stalks off. Sawada remains exactly where he was when Mochida first started to shout like his feet have been frozen to the floor, shoulders slumped, one arm wrapped around his chest as though he wants to hug himself but is determined to resist — except that there’s nothing _determined_ about Sawada.

It makes for a pathetic picture. A pathetic picture that Hana is so utterly _done_ seeing.

[She could respect Sawada’s tenacity, maybe, if it came across as such. If Sawada wanted to be here, was desperate to be here, unwilling to give it up. But Sawada doesn’t act like someone who has dreamed his whole life of joining a Vongola Inc. attack squad, doesn’t seem to have any goals at all. So why doesn’t he apply for a job that might make him _happy_ instead of one that _will_ get him killed?]

It’s none of Hana’s business what her squad’s members do with their lives. What choices have brought them here. All of them made it through the preliminaries — though how _Sawada_ managed that feat is a mystery — so Hana doesn’t get to tell any of them whether or not they belong. Except that Sawada clearly _doesn’t_ belong. And Hana is tired of being pulled down by his suffering.

But through his entire tirade, Mochida hasn’t once said the one thing that truly matters, the one thing that might get through to Sawada. As always, the dirty job falls to Hana because no one else will get it done.

[Even back when they were kids, Kyouko needed the flawless facade more than Hana needed clean hands.]

So she steps up and she looks straight into Sawada’s watery brown eyes because she owes him that much and she tells him what everyone’s thinking and no one has the guts to say out loud: "You need to drop out, Sawada." It’s not an insult or an accusation, it’s a fact. "Even if by some miracle you make it through the final test round, in a real fight you’ll be a liability at best and get one of us killed for real at worst. Do you understand that?"

[It’s not really Hana’s concern. Once they get field-ready, Hana will stick it out with her squad for two more months, let them find a routine, share some experience in the field before she’ll request a transfer to the legal department.

But. Hana has spent the last four months with these people and for all that she doesn’t particularly like Sawada, is growing more tired of his pitiful attitude every day, she doesn’t want him dead.

She doesn’t want to see what becoming a killer would to do to him.]

Sawada flinches like he does every time someone addresses him in a sharp tone of voice. Lowers his head. Shakes, though that might be from his half-breakdown when Mochida lost his shit. The point is: None of that is an _agreement_. And Hana wants that agreement. Needs it. She needs Sawada to understand. And failing that she needs him to tell her why she’s wrong. Needs to see that there’s something in Sawada that believes, something that’s driving him, something that keeps him here.

[Something other than stagnation and fear of the unknown.]

One of their trainers interrupts them and Sawada takes that chance to slip out of the room without giving Hana anything but another wide-eyed look with trembling lips.

[It makes her feel something that might have been uncomfortable if Hana had the energy to process it. She doesn’t though, and that might be for the best. Because Sawada is something soft and vulnerable trapped in a deadly world he can’t seem to figure out how to escape and when he looks at her with fear, Hana thinks this must be what it feels like to be a monster. She thinks she could hate Sawada for that.]

The next morning, Sawada shows up for training fifteen minutes late but he does show up. Hana kicks a hole through a wall.

* * *

Sawada gets cleared for the field.

 _Sawada_ gets cleared for the field.

Sawada gets _cleared_ for the field.

This doesn’t compute.

* * *

Sawada cheated. He _must_ have. There’s no way he could have passed the test. Even if he outperformed every single person on their squad, the amount of previous failures that have been carefully noted down in his file by each of their instructors should’ve barred him from ever entering the field.

With no reasonable explanation for how Sawada accomplished this feat — though to his credit he looked as shocked as everyone else when they got the news — Hana is convinced that he cheated. She doesn’t know _how_ since the exams are designed to be fool-proof [but what system is?] but it’s the only rational explanation she can come up with.

So Hana hacks Sawada’s file. She doesn’t know what she expects. Unrealistically good grades perhaps? No test results at all? But what she finds isn’t it: Sawada failed the final exam. Like they all expected him to.

He’s been cleared for duty _despite_ failing every single test Vongola Inc. has in place to ensure their operatives are at the level they need to be to succeed in the field. [And even at that level, accidents happen. Misfires happen. People _die_. This isn’t a fucking game.]

Hana’s eyes narrow to slits so thin, even Kyouko would take a step back if she could see her right now.

Unless Sawada has some type of ridiculously strong mental manipulation gift — which the administration would’ve caught, they’re much more vigilant regarding mental gifts than physical ones — the only explanation is that someone wants Sawada in the field. No matter the scores, the talent and whether or not he’s suited for it.

[See, Hana wants to believe there’s nothing nefarious going on here. She wants to appreciate this as an innocent filing error or even some classic underdog story where the unremarkable hero finally catches a break. Except that’s a lie. That’s the type of thing Kyouko might like, but Hana is a realist. She’s looked the statistics up. She knows the odds of Sawada surviving in the field. Knows how this story is gonna end.]

Someone is playing games. With Sawada. With her squad. With Hana’s life.

This won’t do.

* * *

Hana will never a shoot with Mochida’s deadly accuracy. Will never slip below people’s radar the way Miura does. Will never read people the way Kyouko can. Will never race for four hours without slowing down the way Sasawaga does, the moron who doesn’t understand the meaning of 'don’t overdo it'.

Hana plans and no matter how many adjustments it takes, she _makes those plans work_.

[Hana is sharp and vicious and rarely kind but this squad is _hers_ until she chooses to relinquish it. If her eyes burn in the color of a faded, washed-out orange, well, the Vongola Inc. administration isn’t very good at detecting gifts it hasn’t encountered before.]

* * *

They make it work. Somehow, impossibly, they do. Hana didn’t have much of an opinion on her squad when she first met them, but with every day _out in the real world_ , _playing with the big kids_ her respect for each one of them grows. Because they make it. Day after day, week after week. They go out into the field and they _come back_.

Alive.

Even Sawada, who keeps showing up again every morning around eight o’clock like it never occurs him to be anywhere else. [Why doesn’t he just leave?]

Hana isn’t sure whether everyone else has come to the same realization she has or if the understanding has sunken in how dead serious this shit is the first time a villain shot real bullets at them, but they’ve shifted from _getting rid off Sawada_ to _somehow keeping Sawada (and everyone else) alive_ in the span of a few weeks.

That’s not to say that they’re a good team. But they make it work. If they survive long enough to gain the experience they need, Hana thinks they might actually become great. But that's a big 'if'.

The job is stressful, very much so. They’re all triple-checking everything because they have to compensate for a team member whose lack of fighting abilities and coordination works against them every step of the way, no matter how many refresher courses Mochida volunteers Sawada for. Hana can’t trust her team to have her back if Sawada is part of it and worries about what else Sawada might fuck up when he isn’t in her sights because if anyone can accidentally detonate a bomb, it's him. It’s definitely not how Hana imagined field work would be.

Granted, the missions aren’t that hard yet. They’re still a trainee squad, have more supervision and back-up than they will once they’ve found their footing.

[That none of said supervisors have taken Sawada off the squad yet raises every single one of the thin hairs on the back of Hana’s neck. Vongola Inc. isn’t the epitome of virtue by any means but the organization draws the line at gross incompetence. Not out of concern about their employees health of course but out of practicality. Incompetent operatives cause damage and pose risks that Vongola will have to pay and answer for, so they don’t tend to invest in them. That’s just good business sense.

That no one has identified Sawada as one such risk is neither impressive nor ridiculous. It’s _suspicious_. It speaks of a rot that goes deeper than Hana had first suspected.]

But it could be worse. Someone [Sawada] could be dead.

Time races past Hana, doesn’t do her the curtesy of giving her even a moment's pause to even catch her breath and reconfigure her plans on how to track down whatever is _wrong_ inside Vongola Inc. and before she knows it, two months have passed and Hana finds herself staring at the automatic reminder on her phone that she herself set over seven months ago.

Because it’s been six months since Hana started her training as a Vongola Inc. attack squad operative. Four months of training and two months of field experience. That’s all Hana ever wanted. Enough to understand her fellow employees so that when she would stand in front of a judgmental court made of clueless civilians, she could defend those same operatives with the passion of someone how _knows_ what they’re talking about.

[Hana doesn’t lie to herself. She’s not cut out to be on an attack squad. She doesn’t care for the violence, the life or death battles, the burns and the hurt. She doesn’t care for the adrenaline that doesn’t block pain nearly as well as science fiction movies had her believe and she doesn’t care for the fear clawing up in the back of her throat every time one of her squad members misses their check-in during a mission.

She doesn’t care for the lose-lose situations, the fact that you can’t save everyone, the fact that _justice_ has no place on a battlefield. She doesn’t care for the twists and outcomes she can’t predict, for the various levels of skill her opponents hold against which she’ll never win an honest battle, no matter how long she trains. Hana is _good_ and with time she’ll fool her enemies into believing she’s _better_ than they are but sweat and blood isn’t where Hana is at home.

It’s the politics and string-pulling behind the scenes, the maneuvers in the courts of the law and public opinion — both equally important — that fascinate her, that Hana loves to navigate. A world that is just as cutthroat, a battle that can be just as deadly but it’s one ruled by the power of words, logic and conviction. It's restricted by laws Hana knows and breathes and twists to her advantage like she’s never done anything else.

It’s where she _belongs_.]

Today is the perfect day for Hana to hand in her request for transfer. To the legal department that will welcome her with open arms, that may be an equally sink or swim world but won’t put any guns in her hands. A place that will challenge her beyond a furious, desperate _keep this fucking idiot alive_ mission that shouldn't even be hers to carry.

It’s the goal Hana’s been working for all her life.

But.

[The Hana from seven months ago hadn’t foreseen the bonds training together for six months, having each others’ backs in fights to the death, covering for one glaringly obvious weakness together would create. She hadn’t anticipated that her presence would be _important_ , that her transfer would matter.

Their squad is already down one more member because Sawada counts as more of a chaotic neutral presence that might work in their favor or against them at random. If Hana leaves, they won’t immediately receive a new member because five people are usually more than enough. Except it’s not five, it’s four and Sawada. Sawada, whom someone inside Vongola wants dead and who is going to great lengths to cover it up.

And Hana. Hana can’t just leave them like that.]

Hana closes her eyes. Releases a controlled breath. Opens them.

Deletes the notification.

[She didn’t choose this point in time at random. There’s a reason Hana wanted to be transferred _today_ and it’s a simple one: The statistics speak a clear language. 72.8% of Vongola Inc. attack squad operatives kill their first perp within their first year on the field. 13.4% of Vongola Inc. attack squad operatives die in the line of duty within their first year on the field.

Both are statistics Hana does not plan to become a part of, but the former one is a greater risk at this point in time than the latter. Most of those deaths aren’t deliberate kills, they are accidents, injuries caused by crumbling buildings, smoke inhalation, that sort of thing.

And she won’t be. It’s still early in her career, she’s only two months into field time. Hana can risk another two, maybe even four if it comes down to it. Enough to figure out how to get someone else assigned to their squad or — failing that — get Sawada transferred to another department. It’ll be fine.]

Sometimes plans have to change.

* * *

So Hana takes a step back. She let the stress of being field-active, of having to cover for Sawada and keeping their squad upright run her down and never once took a moment to breathe and think. It worked, for a time, but it can’t work forever. Hana won’t be around forever to pick up Mochida’s slack when he’s hesitating, to push Sawada down when he gets ideas about _helping_ , to shoot down Miura’s more crazed ideas that she makes sound horrifyingly reasonable.

In other words, she needs to start working on a solution instead of being the solution. Which means approach the problem in a new way.

Since Vongola Inc.’s bureaucracy is as nightmare-inducing as Hana expected it to be, getting another member assigned to their squad is a spectacular failure. [Hana _cannot_ believe the bullheadedness of people who have never even seen a gun in real life but somehow think they can tell her what she does and doesn’t need in a fight.] Unsurprising but it was worth a try.

Which brings Hana to Plan B: Get Sawada off the squad. He’s spent the past two and a half months flapping around on the field like a fish who’s jumped out of an aquarium only to realize that he does, indeed, need water to survive. He’s panicked and cried and thrown up [in Sawada’s defense, they all have, but unlike Sawada they usually manage to control themselves until after the crisis is over] — in short, he’s had his fun.

It’s time to end this.

Since the last time Hana tried to hammer a rational thought into Sawada’s brain, she’s payed attention and realized that Sawada won’t ever get off his ass and do something to improve his life if the only thing to be gained is more happiness and less lethal danger for himself. Which, frankly, is a thought that boggles her mind but alright.

If Sawada refuses to make decent life choices, Hana will make one for him. She doesn’t usually meddle like this, this is 100% Kyouko’s bad influence on her, but Hana has spent too many months keeping this idiot alive. He’s not gonna die on her now.

So Hana files the transfer papers for Sawada.

She does it properly too. Researches Sawada’s high school grades — which range from passable to terrible, how did he make it into the Vongola Inc. attack squad training in the first place? — and interests — of which there are barely any, seriously, does this guy not have a life? — and pays attention to Sawada in action. Most of the time that’s like watching an avalanche come down on top of you in slow motion, but there are parts of their work where Sawada doesn't hold them back. Even — dare she say it — makes himself useful. Like the whole talking to witnesses and calming survivors down part. Especially when there are children. Sawada is awkward and too sensitive and gets too restless around the adults, but with children he’s actually— Not bad.

Based on those same observations, Hana fills out the appropriate forms to get Sawada transferred to Human Resources. Sawada will be fine there. Maybe even do well. Not that he could do any worse than an _attack squad_ but whatever.

The request is denied.

Transfer requests out of attack squads aren’t _denied_. No one wants a well-armed operative who doesn’t feel stable and confident that they can handle their job running around.

At this point Hana has repeated the phrase so often the words have lost all meaning, but in the face of such a monumental, senseless idiocy it bears repeating: _What the fuck, Vongola_.

* * *

Practice doesn’t make perfect but it does make better.

A week passes and then another one. With every successful and unsuccessful mission that they survive together, they get better. Their teamwork improves, their instincts sharpen, they learn to play off each other. They learn to navigate around Sawada. And even Sawada _does_ improve.

He doesn’t panic as much or as obviously anymore. He’s getting better at not getting in the way. He’s getting decent at hand-to-hand combat, even if he sucks at applying those same skills in an actual battle. Hana still isn’t happy to have him at her back, but she can trust him not to bowl her over from behind anymore. And besides they all do their best to keep him out of the actual fights whenever possible. It’s progress.

Not enough but it is what it is.

* * *

In the end. It’s not unexpected. It’s the opposite of unexpected and even that doesn’t seem a strong enough word for it. Because Hana is a planner at heart. She’s imagined this very outcome too often to be slowed down by shock or surprise now that it's actually happening.

[Numbers don’t lie. They can’t show the truth but they reflect trends and probabilities and just because every human being thinks they are the exception doesn’t make it true. Numbers don’t work that way and exceptions mean there’s a majority there whose story is told in those very same statistics.]

Hana knows what it means to walk into a battle with a squad member that can’t handle themselves by her side. She’s gone over the dangers too many times to count at this point, both inside her head and out loud. They all have. They’ve been doing this job for _four months_ and by some miracle they’ve been managing, but beginner’s luck only holds out for so long.

It’s a bad mission.

Not their first one. They’ve already had close calls — too many of those — have gotten injured, hell, Sawada has even gotten himself kidnapped once. None of that knowledge helps prepare them for another one though. None of those past terrors make it any easier to remain calm and level-headed in the heat of the moment.

Most importantly none of it prepares Hana for a super who can control electricity. Whose powers apparently aren’t stopped by their uniforms, going by the charred body of what used to be one of her squad member that's lying crumbled on the other side of the room. [What does it say about her, about this squad that Hana’s first hysterical thought when she watched Nakamura go down screaming is ' _At least it wasn’t Sawada’s fault_.'?]

Communications are down, she’s cut off from possible reinforcements, trapped somewhere in the lower levels of the building. She doesn’t have any smoke bombs left, doesn't have a paralyzer, doesn’t have an exit and her only backup now that Nakamura is dead is Sawada. Sawada who is cowering in the corner furthest away from her and Nakamura's body, back pressed so hard against the wall he’ll have bruises if he survives this, wild, panicked eyes fixated on the crazed super who’s staring at him like Sawada is the fucking North star.

Or his next meal, going by Sawada’s luck.

Hana’s drawn her gun like Sawada should’ve because he’s armed, Hana _knows_ he’s armed. She can see the gun from across the room. And Sawada _isn’t fucking drawing it_.

"Stay back!" she calls out towards the super who's glazed eyes remain fixed on Sawada. "Or I’ll shoot!"

Sawada still isn’t moving. The lightning guy is moving slowly, a demented grin on his lips, blood caking the left half of his face. And Sawada isn’t fucking moving. Not to defend himself. Not to run over and seek cover behind Hana, where she could fucking reach and protect him.

" _Why are you so surprised?_ " Hana can almost hear Kyouko’s voice ask her, curiously puzzled. " _You always knew he would be a liability._ "

Hana fires a warning bullet, half hoping the insane super will miraculously flinch back and let himself be arrested, half praying it will shake some sense into Sawada. Both is too much to ask and when lightening guy takes another step, Hana knows she’s out of time.

He’s too close to Sawada. All he needed to burn Nakamura alive was one touch. [The room is still echoing with his screams. Or is that only in her head?]

Hana doesn't kid herself: She's known how this story would end from the start.

She shoots.

* * *

[As the daughter of a lawyer and a librarian who fell in love over their shared passion for justice in a society that sorely lacked it, Hana didn’t grow up with the system-friendly propaganda her classmates were fed every day. She grew up with heated arguments over human rights over the dinner table, with long-winded discussions about the failures of the system and where and how to best address them.

Hana didn’t grow up glorifying supervillain deaths and she _never_ , _ever_ wanted to take a life. There is a reason why Hana planned to stay no longer than six months with her squad and it’s a simple one: Hana never wanted to become a killer.

But who does?]

* * *

Kurokawa Hana has been an active Vongola Inc. operative on an attack squad for four months, three weeks and six days when she kills René Moretti during a sanctioned mission with a clean headshot.

The official investigation is an open and shut case.

A month after the incident and three weeks into her mandatory therapy, Kurokawa Hana is cleared for the field once more.

* * *

Mandatory therapy is a joke. Hana isn’t going to let a therapist on Vongola Inc.’s payroll get into her head and brainwash her into believing killing isn’t a problem as long as it is for the organization’s gain, thank you very much.

[That’s not quite what the woman said but Hana can read between the lines and even if she couldn’t, she doesn’t trust Vongola. How could she, at this point?]

But Hana is smart and resourceful and has supportive parents who get in touch with some old friends and give her the contact of a psychologist that at least won’t have divided loyalties from the get go. So Hana goes and hopes it’ll help.

In the meantime, she pretends Sawada doesn’t exist.

[He doesn’t thank her. The one time he approaches her, he stutters out an apology of all things as though that would somehow erase the brain splatters Hana can still see behind her closed eyelids. She doesn’t snap and she doesn’t kick him out of a window because Hana is better than that.

She grits her teeth and turns on her heels and locks herself into the bathroom and smashes the mirror until her knuckles are bloody and there are glass shards sticking out of her skin and the screams inside her head finally _shut up_ because Hana is a murderer and nothing anyone does will ever erase that.

The worst part of it is that she doesn’t feel guilty about the life she took. Only grieves for what she broke within _herself_.]

* * *

Here’s one truth Hana has to live with every day: She has taken a man’s life. [And it was easy.]

Here’s another one: If she’d been in that room with anyone on her squad other than Sawada, she wouldn’t have had to.

* * *

Sawada stays out of her way whenever possible and that’s the way Hana likes it. It doesn’t help and at some point she grows used to the bitterness that still twists her insides up into knots at irregular moments when she catches sight of him, but she can bear to look at him again, to give commands and order him to back up and cuss him out for breaking the coffee machine without actually murdering him.

Which she could do. She’s done it once already after all.

* * *

That first time is not the last time. Of course it isn’t. The longer she stays in the field, the more chances there are for something to go wrong and probability theory alone will tell you that sooner or later Hana will find herself in a similar situation, having to make the same choice.

* * *

Not every person Hana shoots is to protect Sawada. Some are to protect a civilian or even herself. Does that make it better?

Hana doubts it, but she realizes she doesn’t truly know.

[If there’s one thing she’s learned in the last month and a half, it’s that Hana is a good killer. Enough conscience not to turn a machine gun onto a crowd of civilians or throw a child off a building, but not enough to feel bad about snuffing a stranger’s life out of existence. Just the way Vongola likes its operatives.

Hana never pictured herself in this gritty, bloody world of field work, never wanted to be, but she makes herself at home all the same.]

* * *

One slow Wednesday morning while cleaning up the mess on her desk, Hana stumbles upon the transfer papers she never handed in. They’re filled out already, even the signature is already in place. Have been for — over a year now, that’s how long it’s been. Back when she first planned out every step of her career at Vongola Inc.

Staring down at her own handwriting that reads like a strangers, Hana considers. She could still hand them in, she supposes. Get transferred to the legal department just like she planned. What’s a delay of a few months?

There’s no reason to think that she couldn’t do the job. In fact, Hana is sure she’d be good. Great even. Certainly she’d make a better lawyer than a field operative.

"Kurokawa, you coming?" Mochida calls from the briefing room. The rising impatience indicates it’s not the first time he’s called her and a glance at the clock tells Hana their daily team meeting was supposed to start five minutes ago.

"Yeah, one moment."

She gets up. Takes one last glance at those papers. Throws them in the rubbish bin underneath her desk and doesn’t look back as she crosses the room in sharp, determined steps. There’s no point to it.

[What she wanted to protect when she made those plans is already lost. And Hana might be a better lawyer but she’s a decent operative. She’s keeping her squad members alive, keeping Sawada alive, which is an achievement all on its own.

She’s already taken lives for the sake of her team, for the sake of the mission even. What’s a few more?]

* * *

In a strange way it makes almost sense. [Out of the two of them, Kyouko is the villain. But it’s Hana who’s always flirted with the darkness looming at the edge of every super’s consciousness. It’s Hana who’s cut out to be a monster.]

* * *

"Why are you here?" Hana asks Sawada on a whim, roughly a year and a half after they were first assigned to the same squad. There’s no deep motivation or reason, not even any real curiosity.

Sawada blinks stupidly at her. "You said the first one to go home and leave you alone with this tower of paperwork would be dangling from the Vongola sign on top of this building by a rope made out of their own entrails."

Hana rolls her eyes. "I meant why did you join an attack squad." _You idiot_ , she almost tacks on but leaves it unspoken in the end. It’s nothing Sawada hasn’t heard before. Damn she needs coffee if her tongue is getting away with her again. It’s not even two in the morning yet.

"Huh?"

Sawada looks honest to god confused. He’s lucky that punching him would require too much effort. Now that Hana thinks about it, so would getting worked up.

"I mean," she says very, very slowly, "that you are the least violent person I’ve ever met, Sawada. You’re a terrible field operative. So why haven’t you quit and applied for something else?"

Sawada stares at her with those illogically huge eyes that are supposedly cute — if Kyouko is to be believed — but that Hana finds off-putting. Possibly because they look at her like that all the time. "Oh." Sawada says as though none of what Hana has just said ever occurred to him. "I’m terrible at everything. And Vongola Inc. were the only ones who offered me a job. So." He shrugs.

Which. Hana isn’t even gonna touch that one. Nope.

"Just get the damn coffee, Sawada," she groans and hopes she’ll have forgotten this conversation in the morning.

[She doesn’t know what she’d hoped to find here, what kind of revelation she’d been waiting for but the worst self-esteem in the history of self-esteem hadn’t been it. If she thinks about the fact that this entire shit-show could’ve been avoided if someone had given Sawada a proper motivational speech as a child, she is gonna _burn_ something.

Probably Vongola Inc.]

* * *

[On bad days, Hana cancels her coffee and cake time with Kyouko, doesn’t look at Sawada unless it is to glower and locks herself into an empty briefing room or her own apartment whenever possible. Her hands don’t shake when she holds a gun or a knife or a rope — they never do — but sometimes when she catches sight of her reflection she breaks it until it breaks her.

On bad days, catching sight of Sawada makes Hana feel every drop of blood drying on her hands, chunks of skin getting caught under her nails, gun powder sticking to her fingers. On bad days, she hates Sawada for what he’s made her become.]

By the time they’ve all been working together as an active squad for two years, every member of the team except Sawada has become a killer.

They don’t talk about it. They don’t acknowledge it.

[The shots one of them took so Sawada wouldn’t have to — because he _wouldn’t have_. They don’t even send him out with a gun anymore because what’s the point of handing someone a weapon they refuse to use? The shots they took to save him. The tasks Mochida assignes specifically so Sawada won't have to see some of the worst they’ve had to face, won't be forced to make choices he isn't prepared for and has too much heart to make. The missions he’s been put on desk duty for that no one else came out of unscratched. It's not even always about blood and death, is the funny thing. There’s so many things worse than murder.]

There’s nothing to talk about.

[On good days, Hana is grateful that it was her behind that trigger. Because even at her worst she’s never wanted Sawada dead.

And. Being a killer suits her, them. That's why they were chosen after all. _That_ 's why they qualified. _That_ 's why Sawada should've never passed his entrance exam. And perhaps one day Hana will make her peace with that knowledge. But the unvoiced issue remains: Sawada isn’t like them. Sawada cares in ways no one on the squad does, no one on any attack squad _should_ , and— It’s not _concern_ that compels Hana to shield him. It’s certainly not _empathy_. It’s self-preservation.]

* * *

Sawada doesn’t thank her for any of the lives she takes on his behalf. Hana doesn’t expect him to. She doesn’t think he understands what she’s protecting him from and a large part of her — a part that pulls the trigger without flinching, that has nightmares about Nakamura’s burned corpse, the smell of his flesh, but never about the man she killed — hopes he never will.

[It’s not the life Kurokawa Hana thought she would want, certainly not the life she planned, but most of her original squad is still alive, _Sawada_ is still alive, even though Hana still doesn’t know who within Vongola is moving against him. And though Sawada is still useless, he’s calmed down a lot over the past two years. Could almost be classified as an asset on his rare good day.

And it’s not always great, not even always good, but. It is.]

**Author's Note:**

> I blame Meg for this. And @hopeswriting on Tumblr who encouraged me. And my lack of self-control. So here we are, with an outside look on Tsuna and the team dynamics within his squad through Hana's eyes. It started with me wondering how the squad handled Tsuna's lack of talent, drive and ambition and then it turned into something far darker than I initially intended.
> 
> If you're curious about other snippets of this verse or want to read a particular POV, feel free to drop me an ask on tumblr: [petroltogo](https://petroltogo.tumblr.com/).
> 
> [On a related note, this is also my headcanon for why Hana - even though at the point where most of the events from [this could've been] a villain's origin story takes place she knows Tsuna pretty well and is aware of many of his issues and gets on well with him overall - doesn't reach out and actively support Tsuna. She's smart enough to recognize that he needs help and though they aren't close by any means, they get on fine. And so she tries to help him even if she goes about a lot of it the wrong way and she does help him in some pretty terrible ways. But. It also leaves her with a lot of only partially resolved trauma that keeps her from really building a meaningful connection with Tsuna.
> 
> And that Issue™ of killing in the field the squad sort of shoulders for Tsuna (not that he ever asked them to or they should have) is also what keeps Tsuna on the outside of his own squad. They don't hate him, but. None of them really want Tsuna with them in the field.
> 
>  ~~Did I mention that everyone in this verse is fucked up?~~ ]
> 
> So anyway, it turns out I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about this. Again, this fic could be canon but doesn't have to be. The choice is yours. It's basically my headcanon for the complicated dynamics in Tsuna's team.
> 
> I hope it makes somewhat sense because this completely ran away with me. If you have the time, please let me know what you think in a comment.  
> Have a great weekend and stay safe!


End file.
